Concert Photographer Openly Ridiculed for His Technique, Band Comes to His Defense

Posted by The Dream Within on Nov 5th, 2013 | Comments Off on Concert Photographer Openly Ridiculed for His Technique, Band Comes to His Defense

The above video, titled “How not to be a photographer at a gig,” has gotten a ton of attention over the past few days as it has made the rounds online. It shows concert photographer Aelle Lucà at a small gig really going at it with the flash and bothering (at the very least) the person who recorded and posted the video.

As you might imagine, the comments section for this video on YouTube quickly turned into a troll-fest of insults and negativity directed at Lucà. But as it turns out, this is exactly what the band wanted and asked for… and his photos turned out pretty darn well.

To be fair, nobody here was entirely in the right. It’s easy, as photo people, to side unanimously with the photographer in the situation — especially after the sheer amount of flack the poor guy took once this video went viral. However, the first band did have to ask him to stop, and according the guy who took the video he was doing this “the WHOLE night.”

That being said, the second band had been asked and given him free rein before the show in hopes of getting better shots than your standard concert photos, and were pleased with the results. So pleased, in fact, that they actually got on YouTube and defended Lucà, silencing at least a few of the naysayers:

We would like to say that Antonio asked us beforehand whether we minded if he got right in there, using flash and getting on stage. we said not at all. This guy has style and we very much respect his work.

Most of us﻿ in the band have been gigging and worked in live music for over 15 years and have seen countless flat, boring photos. Some of you may not agree with this style but the results are fantastic. Who is Jay Zee and what right does he have to say how a photographer should behave?

Lucà himself also got on once the negative comments got to be too much, explaining that he asked the band’s permission for “MASSIVE” use of flash and that the venue was nearly empty anyway.

We’ll leave it up to you to decide what you think of both the photos (which you can find here) and the technique. If the venue had been packed out, we could see how this would become annoying fast as a concert goer… Then again, the band asked him for a certain aesthetic, and he was delivering on that request. What’s your take?